Here Is Why You'll Read This Story
Rhetorical Style in Online News Headlines
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.52610/rhs.v20i71/72.73Keywords:
style, online journalism, tropes, figures of speechAbstract
This article maps and analyzes stylistic devices deployed at the level of headlines in order to evoke readers’ interest in news stories on the web. The analyses show that journalists use a wide range of rhetorical-stylistic devices to arouse curiosity, counter expectations, engage the imagination, and stimulate symmetrical thinking. Some of the moves are familiar acquaintances from classical accounts of ornatus, other are more recent and media specific, including cataphors that create suspense by holding back information. The article positions itself normatively by critically discussing the consequences of such a linguistic strategy, i.e. selling the story by concealing content in the headline. A number of stylistic alternatives are highlighted in which the form of the headline enhances comprehension in accordance with the classical virtues of style, virtutes elocutionis
References
Albeck, Ulla. Dansk stilistik. København: Gyldendal, 7. udgave, 1973 [1939].
Albrecht, Jakob. ”Journalist i oprør mod clickbait — du gætter aldrig, hvad han fandt på” (journalisten.dk, 29.9.2014), http://journalisten.dk/journalist-i-oproer-mod-clickbait-dugaetter-aldrig-hvad-han-fandt-paa (downloadet 8.2.2015).
Albæk, Erik, Arjen van Dalen, Signe Pihl-Tingvad, Morten Skovsgaard og Claes de Vreese. Den danske journalist: Værdier, produktion, indhold. Odense: Syddansk Universitetsforlag, 2008.
Aristoteles. Poetik. København: Hans Reitzels Forlag, 1997.
Bell, Allan. The Language of News Media. Oxford/Cambridge: Blackwell, 1991.
Blom, Jonas Nygaard og Kenneth Reinecke Hansen. ”Click bait: Forward-Reference as Lure in Online News Headlines”, Journal of Pragmatics 76 (2015), 87-100.
Boyd, Brian. ”Laughter and Literature: A Play Theory of Humor”, Philosophy and Literature 28-1 (2004), 1-22.
Brône, Geert og Seana Coulson. ”Processing Deliberate Ambiguity in Newspaper Headlines:
Double Grounding”, Discourse Process, 47-3 (2010), 212-236.
Bucaria, Chiara. ”Lexical and Syntactic Ambiguity as a Source of Humor: the Case of Newspaper Headlines”, Humor 17-3 (2004), 279-309.
Burke, Michael. ”Rhetoric and Poetics – The Classical Heritage of Stylistics”, i The Routledge Handbook of Stylistics, red. Michael Burke, 11-30. London/New York: Routledge, 2014.
Burke, Michael. ”Introduction – Stylistics: From Classical Rhetoric to Cognitive Neuroscience”,i The Routledge Handbook of Stylistics, red. Burke, 1-8. London/New York: Routledge, 2014.
Canning, Patricia. ”Functional Stylistics”, i The Routledge Handbook of Stylistics, red. Michael
Burke, 45-67. London/New York: Routledge, 2014.
Cotter, Colleen. News Talk: Investigating the Language of Journalism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010.
El-Arini, Khalid og Joyce Tang. ”News Feed FYI: Click-Baiting” (2014), “http://newsroom.-fb.com/news/2014/08/news-feed-fyi-click-baiting” (downloadet 27.10.14).
Eberholst, Mads Kæmsgaard og Jannie Møller Hartley. ”Sproget på netmedierne”, i Sproget i de elektroniske medier, red. Thomas Thurah og Martin Kristiansen, 163-206. København: Hans Reitzels Forlag, 2013.
Evans, David W., Patrick T. Orr, Steven M. Lazar, Daniel Breton, Jennifer Gerard, David H. Ledbetter, Kathleen Janosco, Jessica Dotts, og Holly Batchelder. ”Human Preferences for Symmetry: Subjective Experience, Cognitive Conflict and Cortical Brain Activity”, PLoS
one 7-6 (2012), e38966.
Fauconnier, Gilles og Mark Turner, The Way We Think. New York: Basic Books, 2002.
Frederiksen, Søren Marquardt. Få det fortalt - Sådan skriver du gode pressemeddelelser. København: Gyldendal, 2009.
Grunwald, Ebbe, Hans Veirup og Gert Smistrup. Journalistens sprog - med et sprogligt serviceeftersyn. 2. udgave, Aarhus: Ajour, 1997.
Habermas, Jürgen, Strukturwandel der Öffentlichkeit. Untersuchungen zu einer Kategorie der bürgerlichen Gesellschaft, Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1996.
Halliday, M.A.K. og Ruqaiya Hasan. Cohesion in English. London: Longman, 1976.
Hartley, Jannie Møller, Radikalisering af kampzonen – En analyse af netjournalistisk praksis og selvforståelse i spændingsfeltet mellem idealer og publikum, ph.d.-afhandling, Roskilde: Roskilde Universitet, 2011.
Iarovici, Edith og Rodica Amel. ”The Strategy of the Headline”, Semiotica, 77-4 (1989), 441-459.
Ifantidou, Elly. ”Newspaper Headlines and Relevance: Ad Hoc Concepts in ad Hoc Contexts”, Journal of Pragmatics 41 (2009), 699-720.
Jønch-Clausen, Heidi. Kamppladser og kommandorum – En analyse af valgreportagens retorik. Odense: Syddansk Universitetsforlag, 2014.
Jørgensen, Charlotte og Christian Kock. ”Form og stil”, i Retorik – Teori og praksis, red. Charlotte Jørgensen og Lisa Villadsen, 177-194. København: Samfundslitteratur, 2009.
Kabel, Lars, Peter From Jacobsen, Annegrete Skovbjerg og Kristian Strøbech. Media Flow – Indhold og nyhedsstrømme i centrum. Aarhus: Danmarks Medie- og Journalisthøjskole, 2014
Klujeff, Marie Lund. Introduktion til retorisk stil, Aarhus: Aarhus Universitet, 2007.
Klujeff, Marie Lund. ”Retorisk stil”, i Retorikkens aktualitet – Grundbog i retorisk analyse. 2. udgave, red. Hanne Roer og Marie Lund Klujeff, 167-190. København: Hans Reitzels Forlag, 2009.
Loewenstein, George. ”Curiosity”, i Encyclopedia of Psychology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003.
Molek-Kozakowska, Katarzyna. ”Towards a Pragma-Linguistic Framework of the Study of Sensationalism in News Headlines”, Discourse & Communication 7-2 (2013), 173-197.
Nielsen, Jakob. ”First 2 Words: A Signal for the Scanning Eye” (6.9.2009), http://www.nngroup.com/articles/first-2-words-a-signal-for scanning/ (downloadet 24.4.2015).
Nielsen, Rasmus Kleis og Kim Schrøder. Danskernes brug af digitale medier og nyheder i 2014 (Roskilde: Roskilde universitet), https://www.ruc.dk/fileadmin/assets/cbit/MMK/Danskernes_brug_af_digitale_medier_og_nyheder_i_2014.pdf (downloadet 10.8.2015).
Outing, Steve og Laura Ruel. ”The Best of Eyetrack III: What We Saw When We Looked Through Their Eyes” (2004), “http://www.poynter.org/extra/eyetrack2004/main.htm” (downloadet 24.4.2015).
Pressenævnet. ”Vedrørende regler for god presseskik” (2013), http://www.pressenaevnet.dk/Love-og-regler/Regler-for-god-presseskik.aspx (downloadet 8.4.2015).
Schaffer, Deborah. ”Shocking Secrets Revealed! The Language of Tabloid Headlines”, ETC: A Review of General Semantics 52-1 (1995), 27-46.
Schmidt, Solveig. Journalistikkens grundtrin. Aarhus: Ajour, 2011.
Schmolz, Helene. Anaphora Resolution and Text Retrieval: A Linguistic Analysis of Hypertexts. Berlin: De Gruyter, 2015.
Schultz, Ida. Bag nyhederne - værdier, idealer og praksis. København: Forlaget Samfundslitteratur, 2004.
Semino, Elena og Jonathan Culpeper (red.), Cognitive Stylistics – Language and Cognition in Text Analysis. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 2002.
Skyum-Nielsen, Peder. Fyndord – Studier i kortformernes retorik. Odense: Odense Universitets forlag, 1992.
Skyum-Nielsen, Peder. Godt dansk. København/Odense: DR og Syddansk Universitetsforlag, 2008.
Splittorf, Pia Hammershøy. ”Skriv aldrig at du brænder for PR” (kommunikationsforum.dk, 22.2.2012) http://www.kommunikationsforum.dk/artikler/bedre-uopfordrede-stillingsansoegninger (downloadet 24.4.2015).
Togeby, Ole. Fungerer denne sætning – Funktionel dansk sproglære. København: Gads Forlag, 2003.
Tverskov, Eva og Kim Tverskov. Sådan gør journalister – Håndbog for alle andre. Aarhus: Ajour,
Wallberg, Filip. ”En elg vandt valget” (journalisten.dk, 16.9.2011), , http://journalisten.dk/enelg-vandt-valget (downloadet 8.2.2015).
van Dijk, Teun A. News as Discourse. Hillsdale, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1988.
Wulff, Hans J. ”Suspense and the Influence of Cataphora on Viewers’ Expectations”, i Suspense. Conceptualizations, Theoretical Analyses, and Empirical Explorations, red. Peter Vorderer,
Hans J. Wulff og Mike Friedrichsen, 1-17. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum and Associates, 1996.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Open Access; CC Erkännande-IckeKommersiell-IngaBearbetningar 4.0
